Pleasure in Small Things

MY COUPONS ARRIVED IN THE MAIL!!!!

Okay, so maybe I shouldn't be so excited about receiving coupons for 55¢ off Tenderflake products. But then again, I'm the same girl who sustained a hand injury on Friday night while scouring the bar floor for money. (Another bar-goer, not expecting someone to stoop down to pick a singular penny off the filthy alcohol-soaked dance floor, stomped on my foot. What an inconsiderate bitch, right?) That, and I really like Tenderflake products.

Year of the Deal: To Date

1. Coupons: I've ordered coupons from the following sites:

Save.ca

Websaver.ca

Brandsaver.ca

Then, I bought an accordion folder at the Dollar Store to sort all my coupons into. (Yesterday was truly one for the history books, folks.)

In the last week, I've read through nearly every post on the Krazy Coupon Lady, as well as checked out the Canadian equivalent, MrsJanuary (who I found out about in Dakshana's coupon article in the Globe). In the coming weeks, I think it's in my best interests to also review a healthy dose of personal finance bloggers' sites, including Give Me Back My Five Bucks Back (who I first read about on Melanie's blog).

In addition to my stockpile limitations, I have one more consideration before I get started though. I'm concerned about the environmental impact of couponing. I generally speaking try to avoid buying products with excessive packaging or waste. So what happens when products I wouldn't typically buy are dirt cheap with coupons? Will I pass them by? Janelle had another take on this:

"I think the concept of thrift is wonderful! There's a lot of excessive and wasteful things in the world. . .I've always aspired to re-purpose, re-use and conserve like people were forced to in the Depression area, but I think coupons, point collecting and stockpiling is a great modern-day adaptation as well :)"

2. Sales: I'm holding out for Value Village's 50% off sale. In the meantime, I'm trying to resist the allure of Jonathan & Olivia's insane Topshop sale. (Everything is between 50 and 80% off.) I now regularly follow the forums and blog at SmartCanucks.

3. Contests: Every single day I review and enter contests through Wannawin and Contest Canada. I enter about 10 contests daily.

However, despite the fact that I really don't care if Big Brother is collecting information about my preferred sleeping position or hue of nailpolish, I hate doing the following things: signing up for newsletters, signing up for websites and, worst of all, "liking" things on Facebook (that's an immediate contest entry deal-breaker).

4. Rewards Points: I detailed my reward collection to date in this post. Ava also shared this story with me, which led me to the Frequent Flyer Master site. More reading is required.

5. Freebies: Nothing to date.

In conclusion, this is possibly the most boring New Year's Resolution that I've made in the last five years. Sorry team.